The Nashville Sierra SCENE (Student Coalition Empowering Nashville Environmentalists)  student group will present the findings of a survey of Nashville environmental issues — toxins and disease, carbon diversion and home energy savings, and economic development and transportation — following the Saturday, May 18 Community Cinema screening of “The Revolutionary Optimists” at Nashville Public Library. The students, from both public and private high schools, used Map Your World, a tool/project affiliated with the film that is being developed at Stanford University. The Nashville Sierra SCENE students are  a pilot group.

“The Revolutionary Optimists,” a film by Maren Grainger-Monsen and Nicole Newnham, follows Amlan Ganguly as he empowers children to become activists and educators, with powerful results. Using street theater, puppetry, and dance as their weapons, the  children in Calcutta’s slums have cut their neighborhoods’ malaria and diarrhea rates in half, and turned former garbage dumps into playing fields. Now, pushing at the limits of optimism, Amlan is attempting to take his work into the brickfields outside Calcutta, where spend their days making and carrying bricks using methods unchanged by centuries.

“The Revolutionary Optimists” proposes a workable solution to intractable problems associated with poverty, including preventable diseases and ineffectual governance. Ganguly’s story suggests that education and child empowerment are crucial keys to lifting entire societies out of hopelessness.

“Inspiring…a vital snapshot of developing world struggles and possibilities” -The Los Angeles Times   

“Critic’s pick!” “People could learn a lot from these little activists” -The Washington Post 

“Three and a half stars” “Hope bubbles through the film…a tribute to the power of optimism” – The Seattle Times, Moira Macdonald  

The screening begins with a catered reception at 2:30 p.m., followed by the screening at 3:00. The Nashville Public Library is located at 615 Church Street, Nashville, Tennessee, 37219.

Community Cinema provides access for all. For accessibility or accommodation requests, please contact Allison Inman by Thursday, May 16, at allison_inman@itvs.org or 615-585-8321.

Presented by ITVS, Nashville Public Television, Nashville Public Library, Nashville Film Festival, Hands On Nashville, The Sierra Club of Middle Tennessee, and Sierra SCENE (Student Coalition Empowering Nashville Environmentalists).

Watch Coming to Independent Lens: The Revolutionary Optimists on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.

Join us for soul food hors d’oeuvres, film & discussion!

Do you salivate over fried chicken, grits and greens? Like to tailgate with ribs, pig’s feet and chit’lins? Food traditions are hard to change, especially when they’re passed on from generation to generation. Baffled by his dad’s unwillingness to change his traditional soul food diet in the face of a health crisis, filmmaker Byron Hurt (HIP HOP: BEYOND BEATS AND RHYMES) sets out to learn more about this rich culinary tradition and its relevance to black cultural identity.

Discussion to follow with Alice Randall, author of The Wind Done Gone and Ada’s Rules; Dawn Freeman, certified health and nutrition coach; and Carol Batey, owner of Good Vibrations Cooking. Reception features a healthy soul food tasting from Zawadi Feasts Catering.

Free and open to the public. Seating is first come, first serve (no RSVPs). Discounted parking available in the library garage

ITVS Community Cinema practices access for all. Please contact Joe Pagetta (jpagetta@wnpt.org ) by Thursday, January 17, for accessibility or accommodation requests.

Presented by ITVS, Nashville Public Television, Nashville Public Library, Nashville Film Festival and Hands On Nashville

Find healthy soul-food-inspired recipes, or submit your own, here.

Award-winning film celebrating the life of Tennessee Native, Puppeteer and Artist to be preceded by a fun art-making event with artist and White collaborator Mike Quinn

Independent Television Service (ITVS), Nashville Public Television (NPT) and the Nashville Public Library bring director Neil Berkeley’s award-winning documentary “Beauty is Embarrassing,’ a film focusing on the life of renowned puppeteer and artist Wayne White, to Community Cinema at the downtown Nashville Public Library  on Saturday, December 15. The free film screening will be preceded by a catered reception and fun art-making exercise with Webb School art professor and longtime friend of White, Mike Quinn. The film screening will be followed by a Q & A with Quinn and Brian Griffin, writer, educator and former MTSU roommate of White, who claims White still owes him a six-pack for eating all of Griffin’s grandmother’s blackberry jam in 1978 in a munchies-fueled episode. The Q&A is certain to be an event. Quinn and Griffin both appear in the film.

The reception and art-making event will start at 2:00 p.m., followed by the screening and Q&A. The entire afternoon is free and open to the public.

Winner of the Audience Award for Best Documentary at the 2012 Nashville Film Festival, “Beauty Is Embarrassing” is a funny, irreverent, joyful and inspiring documentary featuring the life and current times of one of America’s most important artists. Raised in the mountains of Tennessee, White started his career as a cartoonist in New York City and then as a set designer and puppeteer on the NPT (then WDCN) show “Mrs. Cabobble’s Caboose” with Quinn, Alison Mork and host Fran Powell. He then quickly found success as one of the creative forces behind “Pee-wee’s Playhouse,” which led to more work designing some of the most arresting and iconic images in pop culture. Most recently, his word paintings, which feature pithy and often sarcastic text statements crafted onto vintage landscape paintings, have made him a darling of the fine art world.

“Beauty Is Embarrassing” chronicles the vaulted highs and the crushing lows of a commercial artist struggling to find peace and balance between his work and his art. Acting as his own narrator, Wayne guides us through his life using moments from his latest creation: a hilarious, biographical one-man show. The pieces are drawn from performances at venues in Tennessee, New York and Los Angeles including the famous Roseland Ballroom and the Largo Theater. At its core, “Beauty Is Embarrassing” is a reminder that we should all follow our passion. It is those creative impulses that will lead us to where we need to go.

Quinn met White in a drawing class at MTSU in the late 70’s.  “I’m pretty sure he got an ‘A,’ but I only got a ‘C’,“ says Quinn. “We partied hard back then and had fun performing gonzo-Dada puppet shows.“

After college Wayne asked Quinn to help out with “Mrs. Cabobble’s Caboose,” a music education show for first and second graders.  He made the P.T. Pickens costume to Wayne’s specifications and “danced around  TV with Fran and the puppet gang;  for 16 years or more in some states!” he says. In 1987, Wayne went back to New York to work on “Pee Wee’s Playhouse,” and Quinn designed and built the set and puppets for Powell’s sequel for third and fourth graders, “Music Funfactory,” for which he won an Emmy.

“A few of years ago Wayne showed up to do a puppet building workshop with my students at the Webb School in Bell Buckle,” recalls Quinn. “He had Neil Berkeley and Chris Bradley following him around with cameras and microphones.  It turns out our crazy college puppet stuff was a bigger deal than I thought, and somehow was an influence on Wayne’s now cinematic career.  Those few days ended up as a small part of ‘Beauty is Embarrassing,’ and now I find myself falling through yet another door Wayne has opened while yelling, “Hey, get on in here…this is fun!”

Griffin is writer and educator living in Knoxville, who has taught creative writing at the University of Tennessee, Webb School of Knoxville, the University of Virginia, and other places. An award-winning fiction writer and poet with an MFA in Creative Writing from the UVA, he and Wayne and grew up in Hixson, Tennessee, where their fathers worked at Dupont nylon factory. They attended MTSU together and were roommates.

“We’re bosom pals,” says Griffin. “I spent several weeks with Wayne last summer helping with his “Big Lick Boom” installation at the Taubman Museum in Virginia. It was great to see him again and learn that he hasn’t changed one bit from our college days.”

ITVS Community Cinema Nashville, coordinated by Allison Inman, began in 2008 and has steadily built to an audience ranging from 70-200 per screening, with dozens of community partners contributing each month to reception activities and panel discussions. The monthly screening series features upcoming selections from the Independent Lens season, which airs locally on Nashville Public Television. Over 90 cities across the country participate in the Community Cinema program, making a real contribution on a range of current social issues by connecting communities with organizations, information, and the opportunity to get involved.

The remainder of the 2012-2013 slate of films is below. Films begin at 3:00 p.m. and are preceded by a reception at 2:30 p.m., at the downtown main branch of the Nashville Public Library unless also otherwise noted.

The series is presented by the Independent Television Service (ITVS), Nashville Public Television and the Nashville Public Library, with partners Nashville Film Festival and Hands on Nashville.

JANUARY 19, 2013

Soul Food Junkies
by Byron Hurt

Soul food lies at the heart of African American cultural identity. The black community’s love affair with soul food is deep-rooted, complex, and in some cases, deadly. Soul Food Junkies puts this culinary tradition under the microscope to examine both its significance and its consequences.

FEBRUARY 16, 2013

The Powerbroker
by Bonnie Boswell

Whitney M. Young, Jr. was one of the most celebrated and controversial leaders of the civil rights era. As executive director of the National Urban League, he took the struggle for equality directly to the powerful white elite, gaining allies in business and government, including three presidents.

MARCH 16, 2013

Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroines
by Kristy Guevara-Flanagan

Trace the fascinating evolution and legacy of the original comic book Amazon, Wonder Woman. From her creation in the 1940s to the superhero blockbusters of today, pop culture’s representations of powerful women often reflect society’s anxieties about women’s liberation.

APRIL 20, 2013 (Presented at the Nashville Film Festival, Regal Green Hills Stadium 16)

The Island President
by Jon Shenk, Bonni Cohen and Richard Berge

Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed is confronting a problem greater than any world leader has ever faced — the literal survival of his country and everyone in it. His is the most low-lying country in the world; a minor rise in sea level would literally erase it from the map.

MAY 18, 2013

The Revolutionary Optimists
by Nicole Newnham and Maren Grainger-Monsen

Amlan Ganguly teaches the children of Kolkata’s slums to become leaders in improving their own community’s health and sanitation. Using street theater, dance, and data as their weapons, the children have cut malaria and diarrhea rates in half, increased polio vaccination rates, and turned garbage dumps into playing fields.

JUNE 15, 2013

Love Free or Die
by Macky Alston

Love Free or Die is about a man who has two defining passions that the world cannot reconcile: his love for God and for his partner Mark. The film is about church and state, love and marriage, faith and identity — and openly gay Bishop Eugene Robinson’s struggle to dispel the notion that God’s love has limits.

If you’ve never been to Community Cinema, this will be a great introduction. On October 16, we screened director Brad Lichtenstein’s documentary As Goes Janesville at the downtown Nashville Public Library. The screening was followed by an engaging discussion with business representatives, sociologists, human resources professionals and more. The film is available for screening online until October 30, and luckily for you, we taped the entire discussion. So here’s everything you need — the film, followed by the panel discussion — to have your own Community Cinema experience. It doesn’t include the tasty free snacks before the screening, or the great people you get to socialize with before and after the film, or the beautiful confines of the downtown library, but you’ll just have to imagine that on your own.

About the film:
As goes Janesville, so goes America… a polarized nation losing its grasp on the American Dream. America’s debate over the future of its middle class has come to the forefront in a pitched battle over unions in Wisconsin. First, GM shuts down Janesville’s century-old auto plant in 2008, causing mass layoffs and residents exiled in search of work. Then newly elected governor Scott Walker ignites a firestorm by introducing a bill to end collective bargaining unleashing a fury of protest and sparking a recall election. Spend three years in the lives of laid-off workers trying to reinvent themselves; business leaders aligned with the governor to promote a pro-business agenda they believe will woo new companies to town; and a state senator caught in the middle, trying to bring peace to his warring state and protect workers’ rights. Learn the truth behind the headlines.

Watch As Goes Janesville on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.

About the Panel discussion:

The event, co-presented by ITVS and Nashville Public Television, was hosted by ITVS regional coordinator Allison Inman. The panel consisted of, from left, moderator Steve Cavendish, Nashville City Paper editor; Sachin Chheda, national engagement director for AS GOES JANESVILLE; Tom Negri, Loews Vanderbilt Hotel; Caroline Blackwell, executive director of the Metro Nashville Human Relations Commission; Richard Lloyd, Vanderbilt University professor of sociology and author of Neo-Bohemia: Art and Commerce in the Postindustrial City; and Dan Cornfield, Vanderbilt University professor of sociology and editor of “Work and Occupations” sociological journal.

Season begins September 15 with Half the Sky: Turning Oppression Into Opportunity for Women Worldwide.

NASHVILLE, Tennessee – August 28, 2012 – ITVS, Nashville Public Television and the Nashville Public Library are proud to announce the 2012-2013 season of Community Cinema Nashville. Now in its fifth season, the free screening series presented in partnership with Hands on Nashville and the Nashville Film Festival kicks off Saturday, September 15 at the downtown Nashville Public Library with Half the Sky: Turning Oppression Into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Maro Chermayeff. This landmark documentary miniseries (based on the bestselling book of the same name by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn) follows six actress-advocates — America Ferrera, Diane Lane, Eva Mendes, Meg Ryan, Gabrielle Union, and Olivia Wilde — as they travel to Africa and Asia and meet inspiring, courageous individuals who are confronting oppression and developing real, meaningful solutions.

Community Cinema Nashville this year takes on diverse issues from current news headlines, such as As Goes Janesville, Brad Lichtenstein’s three-year chronicle about the debate over the future of America’s middle class, a debate that has become a pitched battle over unions in the normally tranquil state of Wisconsin; Macky Alston’s Love Free or Die, a portrait of Gene Robinson, the first openly gay elected bishop in the high church traditions of Christendom, whose 2003 elevation in the New Hampshire diocese ignited a worldwide firestorm in the Anglican Communion; and Soul Food Junkies, Byron Hurt’s personal look at the black community’s love affair with soul food, its significance, and its health consequences.

This year, the series continues to align its programming with the Women and Girls Lead campaign — a multiyear public media initiative to focus, educate, and connect citizens worldwide in support of the issues facing women and girls — now nearing the end of its second year.  Women and Girls Lead programs featured this season include:

Solar Mamas, by Jehane Noujaim, introduces the women of India’s Barefoot College, which provides rural women living in poverty with an education that empowers them to make their communities self reliant and sustainable; Kristy Guevara-Flanagan’s Wonder Women: The Untold Story of American Superheroines traces the fascinating evolution and legacy of the original comic book Amazon, Wonder Woman, reflecting society’s anxieties about women’s liberation; and Revolutionary Optimists, by Nicole Newnham and Maren Grainger-Monsen, takes a look at a teacher who empowers the children of Kolkata’s slums to become leaders in improving their own community’s health.

ITVS Community Cinema Nashville, coordinated by Allison Inman, began in 2008 and has steadily built to an audience ranging from 70-200 per screening, with dozens of community partners contributing each month to reception activities and panel discussions. The monthly screening series features upcoming selections from the Independent Lens season, which airs locally on Nashville Public Television. Over 90 cities across the country participate in the Community Cinema program, making a real contribution on a range of current social issues by connecting communities with organizations, information, and the opportunity to get involved.

The complete 2012-2013 slate of films is below. Films begin at 3:00 p.m. and are preceded by a reception at 2:30 p.m., at the downtown main branch of the Nashville Public Library unless also otherwise noted.

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 2012

Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide
by Maro Chermayeff, Jamie Gordon and Mikaela Beardsley

This special Community Cinema screening will preview one of six stories featured in the upcoming PBS mini-series based on Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn’s best-selling book. In the episode on Sex Trafficking, Kristof and actress Meg Ryan meet Somaly Mam, a Cambodian woman who sold herself into slavery as a young girl and who is now a world-renowned leader in the anti-trafficking struggle. Following the film, representatives from End Slavery Tennessee will discuss efforts to stop sex trafficking in Nashville and holistically care for trafficking survivors.

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012 (Reception at 5:45 p.m. / Screening at 6:15 p.m.)

As Goes Janesville
by Brad Lichtenstein

America’s middle class is dwindling, and the debate over how to save it is nowhere fiercer than in the normally tranquil state of Wisconsin. In Janesville, as jobs disappear and families are stretched to their breaking point, citizens and politicians are embroiled in an ideological battle about how to turn things around.

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2012

Solar Mamas
by Jehane Noujaim

Rafea — a 30-year-old Jordanian mother of four — is traveling outside of her village for the first time to attend a solar engineering program at India’s Barefoot College. She will join other poor women from Guatemala, Kenya, Burkina Faso, and Colombia in learning concrete skills to create change in their communities.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15, 2012

Beauty is Embarrassing
by Neil Berkeley

Winner of the Audience Award for Best Documentary at the 2012 Nashville Film Festival, Beauty Is Embarrassing is the funny, irreverent and inspiring story of one of America’s most important artists, Wayne White. Raised in Tennessee, Mr. White has spent the last 30 years making his indelible mark on pop culture. From his humble roots as a puppeteer in Nashville to his work as one of the creators of the “Pee-wee’s Playhouse” TV show to his current life as a darling in the fine art world, White has inspired millions of people across the country. The film chronicles the vaulted highs and the crushing lows of an artist focused on making every day a chance to create.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 19, 2013

Soul Food Junkies
by Byron Hurt

Soul food lies at the heart of African American cultural identity. The black community’s love affair with soul food is deep-rooted, complex, and in some cases, deadly. Soul Food Junkies puts this culinary tradition under the microscope to examine both its significance and its consequences.

SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 2013

The Powerbroker
by Bonnie Boswell

Whitney M. Young, Jr. was one of the most celebrated and controversial leaders of the civil rights era. As executive director of the National Urban League, he took the struggle for equality directly to the powerful white elite, gaining allies in business and government, including three presidents.

SATURDAY, MARCH 16, 2013

Wonder Women! The Untold Story of American Superheroines
by Kristy Guevara-Flanagan

Trace the fascinating evolution and legacy of the original comic book Amazon, Wonder Woman. From her creation in the 1940s to the superhero blockbusters of today, pop culture’s representations of powerful women often reflect society’s anxieties about women’s liberation.

SATURDAY , APRIL 20, 2013 (Presented at the Nashville Film Festival, Regal Green Hills Stadium 16)

The Island President
by Jon Shenk, Bonni Cohen and Richard Berge

Maldives President Mohamed Nasheed is confronting a problem greater than any world leader has ever faced — the literal survival of his country and everyone in it. His is the most low-lying country in the world; a minor rise in sea level would literally erase it from the map.

SATURDAY, MAY 18, 2013

The Revolutionary Optimists
by Nicole Newnham and Maren Grainger-Monsen

Amlan Ganguly teaches the children of Kolkata’s slums to become leaders in improving their own community’s health and sanitation. Using street theater, dance, and data as their weapons, the children have cut malaria and diarrhea rates in half, increased polio vaccination rates, and turned garbage dumps into playing fields.

SATURDAY, JUNE 15, 2013

Love Free or Die
by Macky Alston

Love Free or Die is about a man who has two defining passions that the world cannot reconcile: his love for God and for his partner Mark. The film is about church and state, love and marriage, faith and identity — and openly gay Bishop Eugene Robinson’s struggle to dispel the notion that God’s love has limits.

ITVS COMMUNITY CINEMA is a monthly screening series featuring upcoming selections from the Independent Lens season. Presented in partnership with local public television stations and leading community organizations, ITVS Community Cinema holds preview screenings in over 90 cities across the country making a real contribution on a range of current social issues by connecting communities with organizations, information, and the opportunity to get involved.

ABOUT ITVS AND INDEPENDENT LENS
ITVS is a leading funder and presenter of award-winning documentaries and dramas on public television, innovative new media projects on the Web, and the Emmy Award-winning weekly series Independent Lens on Tuesday nights at 10 PM on PBS. Independent Lens is jointly curated by ITVS and PBS and is funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), a private corporation funded by the American people, with additional funding provided by PBS and the National Endowment for the Arts.

IT’S A WRAP!

Thank you for supporting another season of Community Cinema. You’re invited to tell us what you thought about the 2011 – 2012 season and what you’d like to see more of at Community Cinema events.  Please take 5 minutes to answer the survey and automatically enter to win a Kindle Fire!

2011-2012 COMMUNITY CINEMA SURVEY

Have a great summer and we look forward to seeing you again in September!

Thank you,

Nashville Public Television and Community Cinema

At the ITVS Community Cinema Nashville screening of DAISY BATES: FIRST LADY OF LITTLE ROCK at the Nashville Public Library, mentors and mentees from several organizations in Nashville shared their experience. In these two FLIP camera videos, Clemmie Greenlee, a mentor and founder of Nashville Peacemakers, and her mentee Mykeshia Sanders; and Barbara Woenker, a volunteer mentor with Big Brothers Big Sisters of Middle Tennessee, and her mentee Alasia; talk about their experiences together.

On Saturday, December 17, Community Cinema Nashville hosted a special screening at the Nashville Public Library of TAKING ROOT: THE VISION OF WANGARI MAATHAI. To celebrate the work of Kenya’s Maathai, the Nobel-prize winner and Green Belt Movement founder who died in September,  students from Whites Creek High School and Sierra SCENE (Student Coalition Empowering Nashville Environmentalists) presented their research projects for guests during a pre-screening reception and eco fair.  Following the film, Dr. Cliff Cockerham from Whites Creek High School led a discussion with Sierra SCENE student representatives who all offered eloquent and confident responses to the film and the issues it raised. Cockerham also presented awards to several students for their outstanding environmental science research projects. To further honor the legacy of Maathai, Metro Beautification and Environment Commission donated 75 bald cypress seedlings to attendees and announced plans to plant a special tree at Whites Creek High School in honor of the event.

Raw video of the panel discussion is embedded below.

STUDENT-LED SUSTAINABILITY FAIR TO AUGMENT SCREENING OF TAKING ROOT: THE VISION OF WANGARI MAATHAI, CELEBRATE LIFE OF KENYA’S NOBEL-WINNING ACTIVIST

Nashville Screening To Also Include Seedling Giveaway from Metro Beautification & Environment Commission

Whites Creek High School junior Hailie Wilson took her mysterious health problems to school – specifically, to her environmental science class. When a doctor suggested that Wilson’s vertigo, migraines, asthma and skin growths might be environmental, Wilson, who lives in Bordeaux, began a research project. She’s since been studying the relationship between her symptoms and synthetic chemicals found in soil, water and air in her community, which is near the DuPont chemical plant.

Wilson’s research project, which involves testing and comparing soil samples from the DuPont area and Bethel Church of Christ in Joelton, will be on display at the December 17, 2:00 p.m. ITVS Community Cinema Nashville screening at the downtown Nashville Public Library of TAKING ROOT: THE VISION OF WANGARI MATHAAI as part of a student-led sustainability fair. High school students from Sierra SCENE (Student Coalition Empowering Nashville Environmentalists) will present their research projects before a panel of judges. Prizes will be given to winning projects during the post-screening discussion, which is also led by students and their teacher mentors.

In addition, Metro Beautification and Environment Commission will give away dozens of seedlings to people who sign up to receive one at the screening (first-come, first-served while they last), and announce plans to plant a tree in Nashville to memorialize the life and work of Wangari Maathai.

WHAT: FREE screening/discussion of TAKING ROOT: THE VISION OF WANGARI MAATHAI and student-led sustainability fair.

WHO: ITVS Community Cinema Nashville, presented by NPT, Nashville Public Library, Nashville Film Festival and Hands On Nashville with special partners Sierra SCENE, The Sierra Club of Middle Tennessee, and Metro Beautification and Environment Commission.

WHEN: Saturday, December 17, 2 p.m. reception/sustainability fair, 3 p.m. film/discussion
For more information, visit: http://www.itvs.org/engagement.

Where: Nashville Public Library, Downtown Branch, 615 Church St., Nashville, TN 37219

Please contact Allison Inman (allison_inman@itvs.org or 615-585-8321) by Thursday, December 15, for accessibility or accommodation requests, including captioning, sign language translation, or audio description services.

Here’s a clip:

Community Cinema leapt a step forward this season, thanks to a new partnership with the Belcourt Theatre. As part of the Belcourt’s new education and engagement program, we’re bringing films, including several Community Cinema offerings, to after-school programs across the city. We started in September, screening Abigail Disney’s Women, War & Peace: Pray the Devil Back to Hell to middle school students at the Martha O’Bryan Center in East Nashville. Penny Mitchell, Middle School Coordinator at Martha O’Bryan, leads fantastic, age-appropriate discussions with her 5^th, 6^th, 7^th and 8^th graders, who are eager to learn about the world outside their community. Penny has a knack for making the film’s material – women in Liberia protesting the civil war there – relevant to the lives of these students. She talked with students about life in African countries, which provides an excellent opportunity for American-born kids to better understand situations some of their Somali classmates faced before coming to Nashville. The film presented a chance to discuss concepts of war, peace, and democracy – and the kids got it.

On October 10 and 12, we followed up at Martha O’Bryan with Deaf Jam, which airs Wednesday, November 9, at 9 p.m. on NPT. Deaf Jam, a profile of deaf high school students in New York City who use American Sign Language to perform poetry, was a hit with the middle school students, who were excited to learn more about deaf culture and the poets they saw onscreen. Michelle Muldoon from Hearing Bridges, a local nonprofit that unites the deaf and hearing communities, came to Martha O’Bryan to teach students some basic sign language and talk to them about how to approach deaf people they might meet.

That same week, the Belcourt and Community Cinema also presented an after-school screening of Deaf Jam at Hearing Bridges. About 25 deaf children, teens and adults tuned in for the film. Following the screening, students had the opportunity to chat via Skype with Aneta Brodski, teenage poet and the main subject of the film.

Donice Kaufman and Meena Man at our Downtown Public Library Screening of Deaf Jam. The film will be broadcast nationally on NPT and PBS Stations nationwide on Wed. 11/9 at 9:00 p.m. Central.

That weekend, on October 15, Deaf Jam screened for the public at Nashville Public Library’s monthly Community Cinema event. Hearing Bridges provided ASL interpreters for the introduction and post-screening discussion, and the conversation was also translated via CART — Computer Assisted Realtime Translation – from a laptop in the back of the room to the big screen. Hearing Bridge’s Donice Kaufman led the discussion, featuring Hillsboro High School deaf education teacher Meena Mann, who performed poems via ASL. Meena also talked about showing up for her job interview at Hillsboro with an interpreter, surprising the interview staff, who hadn’t realized before that she was deaf. Several deaf audience members shared their job-search experiences and their love of deaf culture. (For those who haven’t attended a public event with deaf panel members, a translator voiced those comments from a microphone in the audience.) It was a fantastic event and our first experience with CART and ASL translation.

All Community Cinema films include closed captioning, made available upon request, so I hope this is something we’ll continue all season. We’re committed to building translation services into our budget so we can make Community Cinema screenings fully accessible. When we screened The Eyes of Me last season, a film about students at the Texas School for the Blind, we realized how few public screenings are accessible. Thanks to ITVS, who produces the Independent Lens documentaries we show at Community Cinema, all films now include captioning, and we’re working to provide audio description for audience members who are blind or visually impaired.

Thank you to Hearing Bridges, Martha O’Bryan Center, and the Belcourt Theatre for making the build-up to the Deaf Jam broadcast so great – and for bringing a fantastic film/discussion opportunity to Nashville. We’re also thrilled this season to bring Community Cinema films to students at Oasis Center. Details coming soon.

This month, we’re screening We Still Live Here: As Nutayunean for the public on Saturday, November 26, 2:30-5 p.m. at Nashville Public Library’s downtown branch. We’ll also be screening it at Martha O’Bryan. It’s a beautiful film about the Wampanoag people in Massachusetts – the Native people who first greeted the pilgrims – so it’s an ideal learning opportunity as we observe the Thanksgiving holiday.

Hope to see you there!

Allison Inman is National Engagement Coordinator for ITVS and Education and Engagement Coordinator for the Belcourt Theatre.

Photos courtesy of Frank Keesee.